Book Review: “Internal Colonization. Russia’s Imperial Experience”

Madina Tlostanova
10 May 2014

Alexander Etkind’s works are well known both to Russian readers and to Slavists in Europe and the US. In this present, ambitious and controversial project, Etkind attempts to enrich postcolonial theory with new concepts by introducing the Russian imperial experience into the postcolonial scope rather than simply applying postcolonial theoretical constructs to the analysis of the Russian context. The reader will know the purport of Etkind’s approach to the problem of the Russian empire from his previous publications [Etkind 2001, 2003].

Czesław Miłosz: "Native Realm" *

Stefan Jonsson
23 December 2011

Some authors fall into oblivion after their death, whereas others grow in importance. Nobel laureate Czesław Miłosz belongs to the latter category.[1] In Native Realm, a collection of essays from 1959, Czesław Miłosz restores the memory of a lost world. At the date of its publication he is 48 years old, but his experiences far surpass his age.

Book review: "Streets of Crocodiles: Photography, Media, and Postsocialist Landscapes in Poland".

Magdalena Kania Lundholm
03 November 2011

Streets of Crocodiles is a result of the fruitful collaboration between photographer Kamil Turowski and feminist media researcher Katarzyna Marciniak. This book has two goals: to visually document the scenery of the post-socialist urban landscape in Poland and to comment on the country's transition from the ‘old' to the ‘new' Europe. The project draws attention to the post-socialist condition in the country while engaging photography, media culture and scholarly essays. The phenomenon of post-socialism in Europe has predominantly been theorized within the framework of transformation and modernization. This book offers an alternative perspective that is, according to Marciniak, ‘beyond the politics of politeness and superficial appeasement' (p. 172).

Between the Scylla of 'Little Homeland' and Charybdis of Globalisation

Aleksander Fiut
12 May 2009

It is generally assumed that the inhabitant of the "global village" cannot acquire unlimited freedom of choice and unfettered access to a limitless variety of cultural patterns unless he takes for granted the demolition of the established hierarchies as well as a conversion of unique, indeed priceless, accomplishments of the human mind, imagination, and hand into a series of bland items that can be easily taken off any shelf at the global supermarket. Threats of this kind, perceived as proof of thorough Americanization of the European culture, are generally demonized in the form of the ubiquitous hamburger that seems to have replaced the sun as the source of energy and light for the future of humanity.

Book Review: “Deconstructing Europe. Postcolonial Perspectives”.

Paulina Gąsior
15 February 2012

Deconstructing Europe. Postcolonial Perspectives.

Ed. by Sandra Ponzanesi and Bolette B. Blaagaard.

London and New York: Routledge, 2012.169 pp.

The idea of Europe with various layers that constitute the ‘European' identity has grown over a long period of time. It has never been an easily defined concept. From the geographical perspective, in the north, west and south the peninsula is bounded by the sea but the eastern border has always been questionable and Europeans themselves have been in doubt as to where Europe ends in the east. The notion of Europe has never been unified either. From the point of view of the society and culture, the shadows of internal divisions have persisted throughout various periods: the Renaissance polarization between the South and the North followed by the dichotomy of East and West. Thirdly, as Norman Davies [2007, 7] points out, "for many centuries the idea of political Europe was no more than a utopia, an unrealised ideal". Yet, towards the end of the 20th century, with the expansion of the European Union and creation of supranational political, legal and financial institutions, the concept of ‘one' Europe has become a living reality

Book review: "The Postcolonial Unconscious", Neil Lazarus.

Blanka Grzegorczyk
03 December 2011

One result of the boom in postcolonial studies, Ania Loomba first pointed out in her introduction to Colonialism/Postcolonialism is that "essays by a handful of name-brand critics have become more important than the field itself" [Loomba 1998, 4]. Thirteen years later, her words take on a new relevance in The Postcolonial Unconscious, a recent study by Neil Lazarus. Significantly, Lazarus criticizes a theory dedicated to the world beyond the boundaries of Europe and North America for "mistak[ing] a discrete cultural tendency," or what he describes as pomo-postcolonialist criticism ("pomo" as in "postmodernist"), "for the only game in town" [Lazarus 2011, 34].

The End of an Empire: On Iurii Andrukhovych's Novel "Moskoviada"

Per-Arne Bodin
29 April 2009

Iurii Andrukhovych's novel Moskoviada was published in 1992 in Ukrainian and was translated into Russian in 2001. This novel, in addition to three other novels and various collections of poetry and essays, have rendered Andrukhovych one of the most important authors in contemporary Ukraine. Andrukhovych, born in Ivano-Frankivsk and now in his forties, is already regarded as a classic of Ukrainian literature. He is a member of the famous Bu-Ba-Bu, a literary grouping which was formed in 1985. The three syllables signify Burlesk (burlesque), Balahan (farce) and Bufonada (buffoonery), and besides Andrukhovych the members of the group are Viktor Neborak and Oleksander Irvanets. According to one critic Bu-Ba-Bu is the only literary group or movement anywhere that acknowledges Mikhail Bakhtin's writings on the carnivalesque as a major source of inspiration in its artistic practice